JWC questions Mid County notification procedures

WINNSBORO — Greg Ginyard, president of the Jenkinsville Water Company, informed the board of complications the company faced since it was not informed about discolored water coming from its supplier Mid County Water.

Ginyard said Monday night that no one told him or the board anything about the yellowish water, a miscommunication that resulted in JWC technicians flushing around 200,00 gallons of water through the company’s water lines.

Ginyard told the JWC board that the company worked diligently to flush its lines trying to purge the yellowish water from its system only to learn that problem was not on the top end of the system, owned by JWC.

Ginyard said the issue was from the water on the bottom end of the system, gallons JWC purchases from MidCounty Water.

Ginyard maintains that as a customer of Mid County, the company should have contacted Jenkinsville Water Company and explained the discoloration.

Ginyard said he called Mid County Water Company president Herb Rentz on Monday morning to discuss the issue. Ginyard said Mid County’s reliance upon Truvista cable television and the Internet to relay the water information was not helpful to Jenkinsville customers.

Most JWC customers live out of the range of the cable television station and many have no Internet access. He maintained that had the company been contacted, JWC then would have notified its customers to ease their concerns.

Rentz said in hindsight that he should have notified Ginyard about the discolored water. He said in the past he has communicated with Ginyard about chloramines in the water and about leak-related issues.

This time Rentz said he did not contact Jenkinsville because the discoloration is an annual event with the reservoir and in the past the discoloration was so slight that it had not impacted the Jenkinsville system. Rentz said this year the effects were much more severe.

As of Tuesday, Rentz was not sure if the town would reimburse Mid County for expenses related to the discoloration or if any such reimbursement would then be passed along in part to JWC as a Mid County customer. He verified that he requested Jenkinsville keep track of any additional water usage related to flushing the lines and that those issues would be addressed at a later date, if necessary.

As of Wednesday, the answering machine at Mid County still contained a message from Rentz asking customers to call him if they had questions about tinted water of a yellowish brown color. The message stated the water was not an unsafe event and that Mid County was working hard to flush its lines out and move water along. Rentz said the shade of water would get lighter with time and eventually return to normal.

Assistant Waste Water Supervisor Otis Williams said the town is doing all it can to rectify the issue. Heavy rains last summer raised the reservoir more than normal. That led to higher manganese levels in the water when the reservoir turned over, as it does periodically.

Williams said the town is working with state officials to create a stratified oxidation plan for town water sources that will address the problem in the future. Rentz said Mid County is sending its customers written notices. The Town posted information on the yellowish water on its website and sent it to the local cable television station. For secondary water violations, mailings are sent to town water customers.

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